


Breakout (The Interrobang Remix)

by lachatblanche



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Imprisonment, Interrogation, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-11
Updated: 2017-07-11
Packaged: 2018-11-19 03:25:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,835
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11304723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lachatblanche/pseuds/lachatblanche
Summary: Erik is cuffed to a chair in a room in the middle of a government black-site, biding his time before he breaks out and gets what he needs.Then he receives a strange visitor.





	Breakout (The Interrobang Remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Kernezelda](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kernezelda/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Interrobang](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4925872) by [Kernezelda](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kernezelda/pseuds/Kernezelda). 



Erik blinked awake. Bright strobe lights shone down on him benignly, a very different sight to the brown-stained ceiling of the motel he had been sleeping in for the past two nights. The discrepancy between the two caught him momentarily off-guard and it took him a minute to remember where he was.

Incarcerated, was the quick-to-come answer. Held securely in one of the many top-secret black-sites operated by the British government in locations that were unknown to 99% of the world’s population.

Erik had belonged to the other 1%, as evidenced by his attempted - and thwarted - break-in of the facility for as yet unknown reasons. Just how he came by this incredibly sensitive and highly classified information was another matter entirely – one that the facility’s overseers were extremely anxious to discover. 

Erik, needless to say, had not obliged.

Somewhere behind him, a clock ticked loudly, the sound deafening. Erik calmly reached out with his senses and stilled the unseen hands. That sorted, he focused on slowly breathing in and out while swallowing carefully, allowing saliva to moisten the back of his dry throat. He had been drugged earlier in the day, which accounted for the lack of hydration. It was uncomfortable, perhaps, but bearable. 

Erik took a moment to take further stock of himself: he seemed to be alive and unharmed, if a little groggy. The drugs seemed to have mostly worn off, and the after-effects would in all likelihood disappear in a few moments. Satisfied, Erik relaxed minutely. He then finally allowed himself to take a look at his new surroundings. 

He had been moved from the previous interrogation room they’d initially put him in: a slate grey room the size of a large cupboard with a one-sided mirror facing him. The room he was in now was white, not grey – white-walled, white-floored, white-ceilinged – and was the size of a tennis court. There was no one-sided mirror, which he approved of, and the only pieces of furniture inside were a wooden table (white) in front of him and a chair (also white) beneath him.

A chair which he was cuffed to.

So far, so expected.

Erik tugged against his bonds, testing the give on them, and frowned at their very limited reach. It was an unnecessary precaution, given that he was alone and unarmed – at least in the traditional sense – in a compound full of armed and alert soldiers. No, the restriction of movement, along with the cruel tightness of the cuffs, was intentional: an underhanded tactic intended to make the long, tense wait in the tiny white room in the middle of who-knows-where even more unbearable. He had no doubt that many a person had cracked simply from having their circulation hindered – not stopped, of course, that would be in contravention of several human rights laws and international conventions, which was something that most government agencies tried to avoid these days. No, the cuffs weren’t harmful in any way. They were just ever so slightly on the wrong side of _uncomfortable_.

For a moment, Erik played with the idea of removing the cuffs, or at least loosening them and drawing out the reach of the chains. A moment later, however, he dismissed the idea; he had never done anything merely for the sake of comfort before and he wasn’t about to start now. Let the bastards throw whatever they would at him – he would see it out. He had, after all, gone through much, much worse.

Besides, he thought, smiling to himself darkly. The only reason that he was here was because he wanted to be. He had allowed himself to be captured, he had allowed himself to be detained, and he had remained here because the information he wanted was here. The moment he got what he wanted he would be gone – and so would this godforsaken building that the fools had tried to hold him in. He would pull it down around their ears and leave them all in the dust, he promised himself silently.

A wispy suggestion of moving metal whispered across his senses at that moment, breaking him out of his thoughts and causing him to look up attentively. Somewhere down the hallway from the room he was in a door had opened; its hinges moved and Erik could feel the bolt and the latch swing out in an arc. A second later, the door closed. 

Someone was coming.

Erik trained his eyes on the door, forcing himself to sit still.

Moments later, there was the sensation of a hand on the doorknob, and a finger and a thumb pushed back the bolt that held the door shut. A second later, in walked Erik’s interrogator.

Erik blinked. He stared at the intruder, feeling slightly wrong-footed. Before he could stop himself, he snarled out a question. ‘Who the hell are _you_?’

The _you_ in the question was extremely pointed. Erik gritted his teeth, immediately regretting his lack of control. He had revealed his disturbance; meanwhile, the newcomer – the _interrogator_ – merely smiled pleasantly, completely unperturbed by the question.

‘Yes, I suppose I do look somewhat out of place, don’t I?’ the man mused, smiling as if he had turned up marginally underdressed at a cocktail party instead of wandering into a top-level high-security black-bag detention centre dressed like a fusty old librarian. ‘Still,’ the man continued cheerfully. ‘That’s not altogether a bad thing now, is it?’

Erik watched, his eyes narrowed, as the man strolled – not walked, but actually _strolled_ – towards the desk Erik that was manacled behind, all the while with a smile on his face.

Erik had no idea what to make of him.

He had encountered many a government agent and covert operative in his time – indeed, he’d encountered at least a dozen in the last twenty-four hours. Usually, he could have them pegged within seconds. Generally, they were sharp-eyed, hard faced, stern individuals, fierce and uncompromising and not given to betraying an ounce of emotion, particularly in front of a person who posed a threat. Which, of course, Erik very much did.

The man who had entered the room was nothing like that. His face was soft – in fact, _everything_ about him was soft, from the look in his eyes to the material of his knitted blue cardigan. He was short, with wavy brown hair and upturned, rosy red lips, and there was not a single thing about him that so much as whispered _secret agent_.

Erik didn’t know whether to be wary or insulted. He settled for confused.

The man was looking around at the room with an air of mild interest. He smiled vaguely as he caught Erik’s eye. ‘The décor isn’t too impressive, is it?’ he remarked, glancing around at the stark white walls. ‘Altogether Spartan, one might say.’

Erik didn’t answer. He instead surveyed the newcomer cautiously, following his every move with his eyes. His movements were casual and unstudied, without the natural grace and wariness that came from disciplined training. Erik was willing to bet that the man hadn’t so much as taken a self-defence class in his life. It was likely that the only reason that he had been allowed to come in alone was because it was thought that Erik posed no threat to him with his hands so firmly cuffed behind his back.

As if catching the thought, the man glanced down to where Erik’s arms were pulled backward behind the chair. Erik noticed the way his eyes lingered momentarily on the tautness of his arms and chest; with effort he stopped himself from sneering and instead tucked the information away in a corner of his mind. He flexed his arms and then grimaced as the cuffs cut into his wrists once again.

‘Comfortable?’ the man asked innocently, looking for all the world like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth – and like he hadn’t been ogling Erik’s chest just moments before. Erik opened his mouth to hiss out something harsh and insulting in response, but then he abruptly caught sight of the knowing glint in the other man’s eye. His question had not been innocent, he realised; it had been provocative. 

Erik watched him with renewed interest. This odd, cardigan-wearing creature may appear soft, he thought grimly, but there was definite intelligence lurking beneath that pretty, naïve façade. 

‘Tolerably,’ he replied at last, keeping his eyes on the stranger. A quick scanning glance showed him that the man carried nothing on his person: he didn’t even carry a key, let alone a set of interrogation tools. Erik was almost disappointed. ‘I don’t care much for the room service, however.’

The man’s lips twitched at that. Curious. Security forces didn’t usually have a visible sense of humour. Then again, Erik had known from the moment that he’d walked in that this man wasn’t exactly a traditional member of the secret service.

‘I’ll pass the word on to the management,’ the man was a saying, a smile playing around his lips. ‘Maybe leave a note in the suggestion box.’

‘Don’t bother.’ Erik smiled thinly. ‘I don’t plan to return here in any case.’

‘A one-star rating, eh?’ the man smiled and shook his head. ‘Can’t say I blame you.’ He hummed a little tune, appearing completely at ease.

Erik studied him, trying with effort to hide his perplexity. He had been on both sides of an interrogation table in his time, but at no point in his considerable experience had events ever played out like _this_. This was less of an interrogation and more like a casual exchange between friends. 

_Friends_. Erik gave a mental snort. This was probably just another underhanded ploy to ease him into interrogation. He didn’t even know who this man _was_.

At that very moment, the man spoke. ‘My name is Charles, by the way,’ he said pleasantly – and really, _everything_ about the man was pleasant. Even his voice had a soothing quality to it that had Erik wanting to relax right there and then in spite of being handcuffed and tied down by strangers in the middle of god knows where. ‘And you are Erik, I believe. Erik Lehnsherr.’

That got Erik’s attention. ‘How do you know that name?’ he barked, his hackles rising instantly. Around him, the metal in the room gave an infinitesimal shudder as his anger surged out. Erik gritted his teeth in response, trying to settle himself even as he felt the cuffs on his wrist throb in time with his heart. He eyed the man in front of him with burgeoning distrust. ‘Where did you hear it?’ he growled, trying to suppress his anxiety.

Charles raised on eyebrow, seemingly unaware of Erik’s anger. ‘Oh, you know,’ he said vaguely, waving an arm. ‘Here and there.’

Erik ground his teeth together and tried to stem the tide of anxious fury that was flooding through him. ‘Nobody knows that name,’ he gritted out, holding himself back with great effort. ‘Only me.’ Something in his chest clenched as he spoke those words; the name that his mother had given him had been left alone and unused for a long, long time. He had been Max Eisenhardt for a good many years of his adult life, and Magnus Erhardt before that. The last person to call him Erik had been … but no, now was not the time to think of that.

Charles was watching him closely. ‘It is a terrible thing, to lose a name,’ he mused aloud, taking a slow step forward towards the desk that Erik was chained behind. ‘Our names are tied so closely to our self-image … to our sense of self.’ He regarded Erik thoughtfully. ‘I can’t imagine how it must be, to lose that.’

‘I’ve lost nothing,’ Erik bit out, irked by this train of thought. This wasn’t the way that he had expected things to go. He glared at Charles, confused and irritated by this unusual – and perhaps non-existent – interrogation. ‘And you know as well as I do that names hardly matter here, _Charles_.’ He spat the name out in challenge.

Charles’s smile widened. ‘Oh my friend, they matter more than you know. Why do you think that you feel such paralysing fear and hatred when you hear the name of _Herr Schm_ —’

‘Do not speak his name,’ Erik snarled, baring his teeth in anger. He paused as Charles raised an eyebrow at him, and then closed his eyes and took a deep straggling breath, trying to shake away the surging memories. ‘How do you know this? How could you know any of it?’ He had intended to make the words a demand. Instead, they came out in a hoarse whisper.

He looked up to see Charles watching him, and he felt himself instinctively tense under that assessing, unrelenting gaze. The eyes that had initially appeared so soft and clear now appeared dark and inscrutable, and Erik found himself feeling oddly cornered despite the fact that Charles hadn’t moved an inch. ‘What do you know about Schmidt?’ he demanded desperately when Charles did not speak. He paused, waiting for an answer that never came, and then snarled, ‘What do you know about _me_?’

At last, Charles smiled. ‘ _Everything_ ,’ he said quietly.

Erik stared at him. He didn’t speak. For some strange reason he felt floored by the assertion. 

_Everything_. 

It was as if that one word had knocked the wind out of him and left him hollow.

He swallowed and forced himself to speak. ‘You can’t,’ he said, and he was shocked when his voice came out sounding no better than a croak. ‘You cannot.’

‘Why?’ Charles asked.

Erik shook his head. ‘You cannot,’ he repeated. A drop of sweat dropped slipped down his temple as memories surged to the surface of his mind, despite his best attempts to bury them deep and keep his thoughts clear. ‘I have nothing to – I have no … I am no one. There is nothing to know.’

Charles was watching him with an almost pitying expression. ‘Oh my friend,’ he said softly, taking one step forward. ‘There is _everything_.’ His eyes then flicked up to Erik’s, pinning him in place like an insect. ‘And I know it _all_.’

Erik sat there, helpless – and if he had the presence of mind at that moment he would have wondered how he been made so undone by this seemingly unassuming man before him – and stared helplessly as Charles moved – _stalked_ – forward, coming closer. He had reached the desk by now, and his eyes – formerly so blue and pleasant – were now blazing bright, electric in their intensity. He came to a pause at the edge of the desk and then leaned forward. ‘I know who you are,’ he said, his voice no louder than a whisper yet still seeming to echo throughout the room. ‘I know who you are, Erik. I know what you have done, I know what has been done _to_ you. I know your thoughts, your dreams, your fears, your …’ he paused, reached out, and allowed a finger of his to brush against Erik’s, and Erik startled as if he had been electrocuted by the touch. Charles smiled. ‘ _Desires_ ,’ he murmured, his eyes glinting in satisfaction. He licked his lips, and Erik found himself staring at them, hypnotised. It was only the tug of the cuffs that brought him back to himself, and then he tore his hands away as far as he could, his lips curling in a snarl.

 _So that’s his play_ , he thought, sneering to himself.

‘Get away,’ he hissed, glaring at Charles and recoiling from him. ‘You think you can get to me like that? With a few whispered words of understanding from a pretty face?’ He laughed harshly. ‘It won’t work. Tell your masters that your talents are better used elsewhere; you will get nothing out of me.’

Charles regarded him with interest. At Erik’s final words, he raised an eyebrow. ‘Masters?’ he repeated, looking amused. ‘You believe that I have masters?’

Erik paused, suddenly alert.

Charles continued, sounding amused. ‘There appears to be a crossed wire here. Just who do you imagine I am?’

‘I don’t give a fuck,’ Erik snarled, even as he felt his heart rate pick up. He glared at Charles and quietly set his focus on loosening the grasp of the cuffs around his wrists. He’d had enough. It was time to end this and get on with things. ‘All I know is that I am done with this fucking interro—’

_BANG!_

They both jumped. A second later, Charles frowned and then sighed. ‘ _Raven_ ,’ he said ruefully, shaking his head. He turned an apologetic eye on Erik. ‘She always was overly impatient.’

‘Wh—’ Erik began, not understanding, but then the sound of a gunshot drowned out his words, followed quickly by cries of alarm.

‘Charles, get your ass _out_ of there!’ a sharp female voice shouted from down the corridor. ‘Or I swear to god, I am going to actually _leave_ you in one of these shitty little cells.’

Charles let out a _hrrumph_ , sounding indignant at the prospect. Erik just stared at him, completely perplexed.

‘Coming, coming,’ he muttered, sounding severely injured. He then turned and surveyed Erik. ‘Right then.’ He put his hands on his hips. ‘I think we’d better get you out of those cuffs now, hadn’t we?’

Erik’s eyes narrowed. ‘What?’ he asked sharply. ‘Why?’ The sounds of gunfire from outside made him pause for a second and then turn a piercing look on Charles. ‘What’s going on? Who’s attacking you?’

‘All very good questions,’ Charles admitted, sounding oddly cheerful. ‘The short answer is that it’s actually _us_ attacking _them_ , and the Why bit is so that we can all escape. I think that about covers the essential bits.’

‘Escape?’ Erik stared at him. ‘Why do _you_ want to escape?’

Charles frowned. ‘Well I didn’t break in here and stage a rescue just so that I could be _captured_ now, did I?’ he asked, looking at Erik like there was something wrong with him. ‘That would be daft.’

Erik felt dazed. ‘You … broke in?’ he repeated dumbly. ‘You mean … you weren’t here to _interrogate_ me?’

‘Hmm?’ Charles blinked at him in astonishment and then smiled. ‘Oh no, you got it all wrong. I don’t _work_ here, darling.’

Erik stared at him. ‘What?’ he asked flatly.

‘I’m not sure if I should be insulted or flattered, being mistaken for a government spook,’ Charles said airily. ‘Really, though. I thought I had been quite obvious about it. I’m not here to interrogate you, Erik. I’m here to _rescue_ you.’

The sound of a dozen bullets hitting a wall made them both pause. Then Charles let out an irritated sigh and raised a hand to his temple. ‘If you want something done …’ he muttered. A moment later, silence reigned.

‘There,’ Charles said, lowering his hand to his side and smiling at Erik, who just stared at him, his spine rigid. ‘A bit of peace and quiet. Now, how do you feel about getting out of here?’

The words made Erik jerk to attention. He gritted his teeth and shook his head. ‘I can’t go yet,’ he bit out. ‘Schmidt—’ he swallowed down the taste of bile that came with the name. ‘They know about him. They have information about him here. I need it. I’m not going without it.’

Charles let out a sigh that sounded very close to impatient. ‘Oh very well,’ he said in a long-suffering voice, and then he brought his hand up once more to his forehead and closed his eyes. A moment later, he opened them. ‘Sebastian Shaw,’ he recited, watching Erik calmly. ‘Formerly Herr Klaus Schmidt. I have it all. We can go now.’

‘You _have_ it?’ Erik repeated, disbelieving. He watched as Charles lowered his hand to his side. Understanding flooded in. ‘You’re a telepath.’

‘Naturally.’

‘And you’re rescuing me from here – from these people … why?’

Charles shrugged. ‘Because I can,’ he said simply. ‘Because you’re a mutant. Because it’s what I _do_.’

Erik stared at him. ‘Who _are_ you?’ he demanded, feeling completely thrown off by this strange, crazy little man in a cardigan. Wariness and fascination fought inside him. He knew which one was winning.

Charles hesitated for a moment, watching him. Then he sighed. ‘My name is Charles Xavier,’ he said at last, his eyes boring into Erik’s, daring him to say something.

Erik felt his breath catch. _Xavier_. The name surged like a lightning bolt through his brain, igniting memories of the dozens of newspaper headlines and magazine articles that he’d read over the years and bringing them to the fore. _Xavier the Mutant Freedom Fighter. Xavier the Terrorist. Xavier the Hero. Xavier the Coward_.

_Xavier the Mad Man._

‘You?’ Erik whispered, his eyes wide, staring at him. This changed everything. ‘ _You_ are Xavier? The mutant leader?’ 

Charles watched him for a moment. Then he grinned and all of a sudden that mild, pleasant face looked abruptly wild and ferocious. Gone were all illusions at softness and civility. ‘I told you, didn’t I?’ he said, his eyes glittering. ‘ _Names matter._ ’ He waited as Erik sucked in a breath and then reached out and held out his hand to him. ‘I suppose the only real question now is – does my name matter to you?’

Erik stared at the hand.

 _Charles Xavier._ How many times had he heard the name or read it in the papers and wondered? How many times had he wanted to see him, to know him, _join_ him?

Words whispered through his mind, headlines ripped from papers danced in front of his eyes – all of them declaring Xavier a threat, a menace, a terror.

A messiah.

 _A **friend**_ , a voice whispered in his head, soft and sweet and seductive. _An ally. Whatever you need me to be, Erik. Come with me. Come with me, and together we could move the world._

Erik’s eyes fixed on the soft, smooth skin of Charles’s waiting palm, feeling the sudden weight of something momentous in the air. He knew somehow, without a shadow of a doubt, that if he took Charles’s hand then he was on a path that there would be no coming back from; that he would be moving from the shadows into the spotlight; that, if he wanted it, he could in the orbit of this man become something greater and more terrifying than he could at this moment comprehend.

Erik’s eyes moved from the hand up to Charles’s bright, burning eyes.

 _Join me,_ a voice in his mind whispered.

The shackles on his wrist shattered.

Erik rose to his feet.

He and Charles looked at each other.

They smiled.

Erik took Charles’s hand in his, curling his fingers over the softness of Charles’s palm, and the earth itself seemed to tremble at the touch.

Then, together, they left the government facility, stepping over a dozen felled bodies and out into the sunlight. Ahead of them, Charles’s sister watched, waiting in the distance. 

Behind them, the building crumbled and fell.


End file.
